


ever ever after

by dygonilly



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Breaking the Fourth Wall, Disney Logic TM, Fluff, Getting to Know Each Other, Inspired by Enchanted (2007), M/M, Multi, Romance, Talking Animals, copious mentions of true love, mingyu: disney princess, seungkwan: yearning for the theatre and a day of peace, side boohao, side seokgyu, spontaneous singing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 13:00:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29314488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dygonilly/pseuds/dygonilly
Summary: Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, Prince Mingyu went missing on his wedding day.Somewhere a little closer to you and I, Boo Seungkwan wakes up thinking he's going to have a very normal day.(He is not.)
Relationships: Boo Seungkwan/Kim Mingyu
Comments: 25
Kudos: 88





	1. Prologue: Once upon a time...

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pixiepower](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pixiepower/gifts).



> Hello and welcome! Please enjoy this self indulgent gift for my beautiful friend, Miss Disney herself. I love you and thank you for sharing this idea with me.
> 
> This is heavily based off the movie "Enchanted". It's okay if you haven't seen it - just imagine the first part as a cartoon, and it'll make a lot more sense. Trust me. 
> 
> Also, for later chapters if an entire line of dialogue is in italics, you can just assume the person is singing. You'll have to make up the tune yourself, though. Think of it as a collaborative moment.
> 
> ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* enjoy!!!!! *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“Will you stand still!” Seungcheol hoots.

“Sorry! Sorry,” Mingyu stops fidgeting and allows the birds to continue tugging at the bright swathes of fabric around his body, the long strands of his hair. “I’m just so excited.”

Seungcheol ruffles his feathers as he walks along the vanity. “I know, your highness. But you simply have to stay still, otherwise we’ll never be ready in time.”

“Stop being so boring,” Jeonghan drawls. He yawns wide from his place by the window, looking totally relaxed despite the flurry of activity and animals and accessories literally flying around him. He brings a foot behind his floppy ear to scratch it. “The wedding will wait for him. He’s the prince, after all.”

Mingyu smiles. “As is Seokmin.”

“Yes, but he’s probably been sleeping by the chapel in excitement,” Jeonghan says.

“He has, I saw him,” one of the swallows says into Mingyu’s ear. What gossips! He gasps with delight. The birds finish embroidering his hems with flowers and twist his hair into place atop the crown of his head. A strand comes loose over his brow, but Seungcheol stops the bluebird who flies up to fix it.

“Leave it. It suits him.”

Mingyu beams.

There is a knock at the door and Jeonghan hops over to slide the screen aside. The old tortoise from down the way walks in. They all wait for him to reach Mingyu. They wait like, quite a while actually. Jeonghan starts tapping his hind foot and Seungcheol hoots at him until he stops. 

Finally, _finally_ , Jun reaches Mingyu and looks up at him with a toothless smile, lazy and sweet around the eyes. Mingyu kneels down so they may be more equal, and he smiles in return.

“They are ready for you, your highness,” Jun says. 

“And I am ready for them,” Mingyu says. He can feel his heart beating through all the expensive fabrics, beating for his true love, his happily ever after. Just a ceremony and a kiss away! He stands and spins around to face his friends. 

“Thank you,” he says, pouring all the heart he has into those two words.

Seungcheol shoos him with the tip of his wing. His eyes look shinier than usual. “Go on, your highness. Your future awaits.” 

Jeonghan waves his front paws and pretends to sob, and the rest of the birds and mice sing their farewells and their well wishes. Jun has fallen asleep in the middle of the room. Mingyu gathers the material of his hanbok in his hands and steps around him to rush out of the room, into the sunshine, into the carriage that awaits. 

“Are you comfortable, your highness?” the coachman, Chan, asks brightly. Mingyu nods his assent. “Here we go!”

They ride swiftly up the winding road to the palace at the top of the hill. The closer they get, the more exuberant Mingyu feels. People come out of their homes and wave at him, cheering and holding children on their shoulders so they can be included. Mingyu waves back with both hands, cheeks aching. 

They are almost at the gates when something tugs at his chest and whispers in his ear. He looks out the window and gasps when he sees the old red pine.

“Stop the carriage!” 

Mingyu opens the door and springs out, ignoring Chan when he calls after him. He runs down the path, between the hedges to the ancient tree and the glimmering pond by its side. The water is distrubed by a rhythmic waterfall and beautiful koi fish dance beneath the surface, glistening like jewels. The sounds of the city are muted, here. Mingyu visits this place often, for even a prince needs time to himself. 

He kneels carefully in the short grass, hiking up his robes so the material doesn’t get dirty, and looks into the water. “It’s today,” he tells the koi fish. They swim a little faster at the sound of his voice. “Today is the beginning of my forever! I know I should be frightened, but I’m not. In fact, I’m so excited I can hardly stand it.” 

The fish are swimming faster now, faster than Mingyu has ever seen. They must be excited, too! He leans in even closer to watch their scales dance under the sun, and the water starts to churn. Slowly, at first, then the fish are swimming so quickly that they’re creating a whirlpool. From the heart of it shines a light, bright as the sun—it shines right into Mingyu’s eyes, as though it were seeking him.

How strange… it looks… 

“Your highness?!”

Mingyu leans in, transfixed. He instantly loses his balance and tips into the pond with a cut off shriek.

Chan’s voice falls away, and Mingyu just falls and falls and falls.


	2. though the world will tell you it's not smart

Seungkwan was supposed to leave an hour ago. Technically, he completed all his work tasks before he even went on lunch, because he’s efficient and it’s important that the rest of his team has somebody to look up to. So the reason he’s lingering at the theatre isn’t because his manager told him to. 

It’s sort of embarrassing, but this is a safe space, right? 

Okay, so. Seungkwan works at the LG Arts theatre—big place, lovely, expensive, just as he deserves, blah blah blah—but it’s not in the job he  _ really _ wants. Instead of performing with his name in lights and his perfect side profile donning the posters in the foyer, he’s stuck doing the marketing. Which is not super exciting, but it’s a job he’s really good at, because he’s good at knowing what people want and is very persuasive when he needs to be. 

He’s like an evangelist, if evangelists wore designer shoes and promoted the theatre. 

God, he deserves a raise. 

Anyway. No-one knows that his advertising degree is actually a security blanket covering his tear-away sequined pants and the heart-stopping solo he’s been practising since he was nine years old. 

Well, they know, but they don’t  _ know.  _ They don’t understand how trapped Seungkwan feels in his job—how much it aches to be so close to what he wants yet so laughably far from it at the same time.

And they  _ certainly _ don’t know that he’s been staying behind almost every night this week just to sit alone in the audience and imagine himself on stage, amongst the sets and shining lights. 

When Eunha, one of the set designers, passed him on her way out and asked what he was still doing here, he told her he had some work to finish and threw social media buzzwords at her until she accepted it. Considering opening night is only one week away, it’s not that unbelievable that he’d have to stay back, but he still waited until Eunha had left the building entirely before walking into the theatre and sitting right at the back where he couldn’t be seen.

So that was an hour ago, and now you’re all caught up. Where were we? Ah! Yes:

_ Boo Seungkwan’s Failure To Become A Broadway Star. _

It’s alright. He came to terms with the idea that he was going to be stuck working in the wings pretty early on. Life is like that. It gives you the illusion of a choice in the form of a fork in the road—tells you that  _ you can have anything you want! It’s up to you! _ But when you take the bright and exciting path it suddenly drops off, turns into a cliff edge and forces you to build a bridge that you don’t have the materials for.

Seungkwan waited on that path for a long time. He thought the bridge would build itself, but it never did, and everyone kept telling him that it wasn’t worth it to keep trying. Eventually, he believed it. Eventually, he had no choice but to keep moving, so he doubled back and took the boring path instead. 

This path pays the rent and funds his coffee habits and it introduced him to some of the best friends in the world, so he doesn’t hate it. It’s just difficult not to imagine what might have been. 

Joshua says that his habit of yearning for another life is self-sabotaging, but Joshua says a lot of things. Seungkwan only listens to those that benefit him.

The stage is set up for a re-run of  _ Wicked! _ because it did pretty well on its first round, and they found a new idol to take the leading role between comebacks, so in corporate terms, that’s a good enough reason to recycle the show. 

Seungkwan can’t complain—he loves it. He’s been sneaking in to watch rehearsals. The dragon hanging over the top of the stage looks less haunting when it's not lit up, and they must have been rehearsing the second act today, because the stage is paused on the cornfield scene: post-hurricane, post-squashing-of-the-witch. It’s all very dramatic. Seungkwan lets out his umpteenth yearning sigh of the hour.

He’s just about to take his phone out and play the soundtrack to really immerse himself when there’s a yell from the wings. 

“Hello?” comes a strangled voice. “Oh dear. Oh no.”

Seungkwan sinks into his seat. He’s not technically meant to be in here.

There’s a crash like something has been tipped over and then a man rushes onto the stage in… a hanbok? 

“Chan? Seungcheol?!” The man begins pushing through the fake cornfield like he’s looking for someone. He turns and faces the seats. “Hello? I seem to be lost in—ARGHH!” He screams at the sight of the (yet again,  _ fake _ ) dragon above the stage and falls backwards onto the floor with his hands held over his face. 

Seungkwan sits up, interested. Is this guy an actor? Maybe the company is starting a side production that he doesn’t know about. It’s in his interest to know everything he possibly can, which is why he does what he does next.

“Hello!” he calls, walking down the aisle between the expensive seats and stopping just before the orchestra pit. “Did you need help?”

The man looks around frantically until he sees Seungkwan. “Oh! Yes, please.” He scrambles to his feet. Christ. Seungkwan cranes his neck. “I’m very lost.” 

“Seems like you’re at the wrong rehearsal.” Seungkwan gestures to his red hanbok with a laugh. “MBC is down the street.”

“I don’t know what that is,” the man says with despair. “I’m trying to get to the palace.”

“Of course you are,” Seungkwan says sweetly. Classic method actor. Whatever, he’s dealt with weirder, and this guy is really hot so it’s not too much of a stretch to act like he’s interested in his well being. “You’ll have to jump off the edge to get down, sorry. I don’t have backstage access.” The man follows his instructions blindly, landing with a dull thud on the carpet before the front row.

“How did you get in here, by the way?” 

The man brightens. “I fell into the pond!”

“The… okay.” Seungkwan takes his phone out and Mingyu frowns at it. God, a method actor  _ and  _ an Android elitist? Seungkwan breathes out through his nose. “Do you need me to call you a car or something?”

“What is your name?” the man asks suddenly.

“Um. Boo Seungkwan.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you! I am Kim Mingyu, prince of Andalasia.” Mingyu does a bow so sweeping that Seungkwan has to take a step back. He straightens up with a smile. “I feel better knowing the name of the man who has saved me from the terrifying beast.” He subtly points to the dragon. 

“Uh-huh,” Seungkwan says, feeling more and more lost. 

Mingyu starts speaking quietly to himself. “Oh, they must be so mad at me… but how was I to know that the pond was spelled?” He goes to sit in one of the chairs in the front row but the seat keeps flipping back up before he can sit down. He makes a cute sound of annoyance and tries again. Again, the seat flips up just before he can sit on it. “What is this invention?!” 

Seungkwan scoffs and says, “I know, right? This one time, my friend got up to adjust his pants and then when he sat back down it had already flipped up, so he ended up ass to the floor. I mean, it was funny at the time but really, theatre seating and by extension the theatre itself is still quite inaccessible if you think about it. Ticket prices are still exorbitantly high and they refuse to film any of the performances to reach a broader audience, despite my strong and very correct argument that it would be a highly effective marketing technique. I mean, how can it still be considered such ‘high art’ when the audience is sitting here with  _ popcorn _ watching as their favourite K-pop idol gets squished by a house in a cornfield?”

Mingyu watches him speak with wide eyes.

Seungkwan clears his throat. “Right. Well, that’s my daily rant. You’re lucky I’m not charging you,” he adds threateningly.

“I do not have any money,” Mingyu says, and promptly bursts into tears.

“It was a joke!” Seungkwan flutters his hands a few feet away from Mingyu’s heaving shoulders. “It was a joke, I’m so sorry.” He’s great with kids but crying adults are another beast entirely. His roommate, Hansol, has only cried in front of him twice across their six year friendship, Minghao is apparently too put-together to cry, and Joshua Hong might be a real life Barbie at this point. He’s really not sure. Either way, he hasn’t had to comfort any other crying men besides himself since… well. Ever. 

It might be frying his brain, because it pushes him to make the second questionable decision of the evening.

“It’s okay, Mingyu-ssi, how about we just… go to my place?”  _ What? _ “It’s not that far.”  _ Yes, it is. _ “And you can calm down and call your friend. We’ll get you to wherever you need to be.”  _ What the— _

“Thank you, Seungkwan-ssi,” Mingyu sniffs, finally calming. “That’s so kind of you. I will make sure you and your family are generously cared for by the kingdom in return.”

“Oh, that’s not necessary,” Seungkwan laughs nervously. “You can just like, buy me a bottle of wine.”  _ Or get me an interview at MBC _ , he thinks, and then he thinks, _ I can’t sell out for television _ , and then he remembers he’s not even an actor and scraps the whole line of thinking entirely. 

Mingyu’s sobs dry up into little sniffles and Seungkwan passes him a tissue from his satchel, which he takes daintily despite his beefy man-hands. “Are you also of royalty?” Mingyu asks while dabbing his cheeks.

“What?” Is Mingyu trying to pull him into an improv moment? He’s not really in the mood. 

“You speak with such authority and your gait is very regal.” Mingyu pushes his shoulders back as if to demonstrate.

“Oh,” Seungkwan preens and flaps his wrist at him, “That’s the pilates.”

Mingyu makes a sound of interest. “Is that close to Andalasia?”

“Um, it’s… yoga-adjacent, I guess.”

Mingyu’s sound of interest goes a bit wobbly. Seungkwan just sort of stares at him until his phone buzzes with the notification from the taxi app.

“Off we go, then.” He herds Mingyu out of the theatre, pointedly not thinking about how expensive the drive home is going to be and focusing instead on all the good karma he’ll be getting in return. 

Seungkwan finds the car and waves, confirming his identity with the driver before opening the back door. Mingyu doesn’t move.

“Are you getting in?” 

Mingyu looks at him with wide eyes. “Is this some kind of carriage?”

“Okay, the method acting was cute while we were inside the _ theatre _ —” Seungkwan sings the word out of respect “—but I’m gonna need you to drop the prince thing and get in the car if you want my help. He’s already started charging my account.”

The driver waves at Mingyu through the window. 

“I’m very lost—”

“You’re lost! Yes!” Seungkwan grabs Mingyu’s elbow and hustles him towards the car. “And we are currently solving that mystery, Kim Mingyu-ssi, but in order to do so you need to get in the car. Please,” he adds sweetly.

“Okay, I trust you,” Mingyu says very seriously, and ducks down to slide along the backseat. 

Seungkwan chants, “I’m a good person, I’m a good person” then he gets in and closes the door.

While Mingyu is pressing his face to the window and pointing out weird things like street lamps and billboards, Seungkwan takes out his phone and opens his chat with Joshua.

**Seungkwan  
** _ SOS. I’m being a good samaritan  _

**Joshua  
** _ who is this lol _

**Seungkwan  
** _ fuck you  
_ _ listen  
_ _ i am taking a starving actor back to my apartment because he is lost and afraid and he needs my help. if i die then u can have my gucci loafers. _

**Joshua  
** _ gag i don’t want those ugly shoes  
_ _ wait why are you taking a man home? did something happen with minghao??? _

**Seungkwan  
** _ [img attached]  
_ _ please refer to my first message _

Mingyu cries, “Seungkwan-ssi, look!” and points excitedly to the bus driving past.

“He’s from the country,” Seungkwan tells the driver with a nervous laugh. The driver doesn’t even acknowledge him.

**Joshua  
** _ this sounds suspicious, but okay  
_ _ keep me updated so i don’t think you’re actually dead  _ _ hahahahaha _

**Seungkwan  
** _ yes what a hilarious scenario  _

**Joshua  
** _ [heart emoji] _

♡♡♡

They make it to Seungkwan’s apartment with relative ease and he only feels kind of dead inside when he sees how much it cost. Mingyu insists on waving at the taxi until it disappears, only relenting when Seungkwan starts tugging on his sleeve. He’s never been thankful that his building isn’t fancy enough for a doorman, but now he’s  _ especially _ thankful. That’s one less person who requires an explanation as to why he’s being accompanied to his apartment by a guy dressed like a Joseon-era prince on any other night besides October 31st. 

“Sorry the place is sort of messy,” he says when they walk in. Hansol hasn’t been home for a week and won’t be here for another two—he’s in Tokyo with his sister, enjoying himself and not sending Seungkwan enough photos—so the apartment is in a better state than usual. 

But Seungkwan really wasn’t expecting guests, you see, so there’s just  _ stuff _ everywhere: laundry in the living room, skin care products all over the kitchen counter from his first and last attempt at a well-lit Instagram live; a yoga mat and weights by the window.

“Your home is beautiful,” Mingyu says earnestly. He finishes taking his shoes off and moves around the space with wide sparkling eyes, carefully, as though he were in a mansion rather than a cramped little two-bedroom apartment. He touches the rice cooker with an expression of awe and asks, “Do you live here by yourself? You must be quite wealthy.”

“No, I have a roommate,” Seungkwan says, cleaning up around Mingyu like a fussy little roomba.

“You’re married?!” gasps Mingyu. 

Seungkwan retches, and Mingyu’s face falls. 

“Sorry if that’s like, your thing, but no. I’m definitely not married. Even if I wanted to—which I don’t—I can’t. At least not in this country.” 

“Oh no. Why not?”

Seungkwan is really running out of patience. He gestures to himself like it should be obvious. It better be. But Mingyu just cocks his head to the side like a lost puppy, waiting for it to be spelled out to him, just as he’s been doing all evening.

Seungkwan sighs. “I am very gay, Mingyu-ssi.”

“Cool! Me too!”

“Really?”

Mingyu nods proudly. “Andalasia has had two queens for a long time. You can imagine how excited my mother was to introduce me to Prince Seokmin so that we could carry on the tradition. Albeit a little differently,” He ducks his head with a smile that is stupidly attractive, “but the heart of it is the same.”

Now it’s Seungkwan’s turn to feel lost. It’s like some bastardised game of badminton. “Queens? Seokmin?”

“Yes, he is my true love. My betrothed. I was on my way to the palace to marry him.”

Seungkwan moves his feather duster from left to right as he says, “And then… the pond…”

Mingyu claps delightedly. “Exactly!”

“Riiiiiight.” Seungkwan turns around to make wide eyes at the pantry.  _ What the fuck,  _ he mouths at the spices.

“Seokmin will come looking for me, though. He’s probably on his way already. We have a necklace that keeps us close.” Mingyu pulls a string out from beneath his robes to reveal a small ring of jade hanging on the end. “It’s been spelled to connect our heartbeats. It will guide him to me.” He makes a sappy expression at it before tucking it back beneath his clothes.

“And how long will it take for him to find you?”

Mingyu hums. “A day, at most. He’s very determined.”

That means Seungkwan has two options: kick this guy out and leave him to wander around until his friend finds him, when he has no money and no phone, or let him stay the night and palm him off to his friend in the morning and profit off the good story for at least three weeks—five if he embellishes. And he always does. 

He finds his centre and takes a deep breath. The decision isn’t very difficult. 

“Alright, let’s make a deal. You stay here for the night, until your friend—”

“Betrothed,” Mingyu corrects.

“Uh, yeah, whatever—until he contacts you and you can go home, and I can go on with my weekend as if nothing ever happened and my friends don’t think I’m crazy bonkers insane for letting some rando into my apartment. How does that sound?”

“You have a very particular way of speaking,” Mingyu says. There’s that smile again.

Seungkwan ignores it, tips his chin and holds out his hand. “Deal?”

“Deal.” Mingyu shakes his hand, then he bends down and  _ kisses _ Seungkwan’s knuckles, looking up through his lashes to say, “Thank you.”

Seungkwan’s laugh sounds like a rubber chicken deflating. “It’s whatever.” He pulls away and busies himself with violently unfolding the couch between them. 

Mingyu steps forward as if to help but Seungkwan shoos him away, insisting he knows how to do it. Only once he’s half mounted the thing and sworn at the lever and also the entire nation of Sweden, does he finally get it open. 

He puts his hands on his hips and blows his hair out of his eyes. “Well. There you go.”

“What a marvellous magic trick! You are full of surprises, Seungkwan-ssi.”

“You can drop the formalities, you’re about to sleep on my couch. And we look the same age, anyway,” he calls from within the linen cupboard.

“Yes, I am twenty-five. I have lived a long and wonderful life.”

Seungkwan dumps an eclectic collection of sheets onto the mattress beside Mingyu where he is sprawled out, feet dangling off the edge. “God, why do you say it like we have ten years left to live?” he bemoans.

Mingyu looks up at him like  _ he’s  _ the one being daft. Seungkwan feels affronted and also uncomfortable at the reminder that he’s like, closer to middle-age than he’s ever been in his life. Ugh. He’ll take some extra collagen in the morning. He’s not desperate enough to ask Joshua for his cosmetician’s personal number. Yet. 

“Anyway, I’m going to bed. Please don’t like, steal anything. I know I’m smaller than you but I also know where all the knives are, so don’t be weird.” He points his finger at Mingyu’s nose. Mingyu goes cross-eyed as he nods. “Good. I’ll also let you have some of Hansol’s old clothes because they’re ugly and I need an excuse to get rid of them while he’s away. And you should take off… that.” He gestures at the hanbok. He still can’t tell if it’s legit or a nasty party store knock off. Either way, Seungkwan doesn’t like outdoor clothes touching his linens.

Mingyu takes instructions way too literally, it seems, because he stands up and starts undoing the ties just above his waist.

“AH! Not yet!” Seungkwan yelps.

Mingyu smirks. “Are you worried you’d swoon if I were to remove my clothes in front of you?”

“What the f—no—” Seungkwan splutters. Mingyu’s cocky grin only widens, fingers hovering over the ties once more. Seungkwan stomps a foot and leaves the room. “I’m going to bed,” he calls over his shoulder. “No nudity in the shared spaces, and you can shower, but don’t you dare use my expensive body wash!” 

He slams his door and presses his back up against it, heart racing as he pulls his phone out. There’s a message from Minghao that he ignores, feeling oddly guilty. Whatever, he’ll deal with it tomorrow. 

**Seungkwan  
** _ Update: I’m not dead, but the hot guy is getting naked in my living room _

**[Incoming video call from Joshua]**

Seungkwan answers with, “No, I am not holding my phone around the wall so you can perv on him.”

“Awwwwww,” Joshua whines. He’s lying on his stomach in bed, skin dewy and hair perfect, as always. Freak. “So who is he? This is very out of character for you.”

“What? No it’s not. I perform random acts of kindness all the time.”

Joshua snorts. “Yeah, when there’s something in it for you. You’re not even out there ogling him.”

“Because I have a  _ boyfriend _ ,” Seungkwan says indignantly as he sits back against his headboard. “Not all of us have big greedy eyes like you, hyung.”

“Mkay,” Joshua drawls, smirking like he knows something Seungkwan doesn’t. “Well, be safe. We’re still on for Sunday, right?”

“Like I’d miss it,” Seungkwan says venomously.

Joshua laughs around a gentle, “Goodnight” that Seungkwan echoes before hanging up.

There’s a soft knock at his door. 

“Seungkwan? You haven’t given me any clothes to change into.”

Oh, right. Seungkwan prematurely storms off a lot. He’s working on it.

He opens the door slowly. Mingyu is still mostly clothed, but his hair is no longer gathered up in pins and it falls in pretty waves down to his shoulders, tucked sweetly behind his ear on the left side. He smiles in relief when Seungkwan appears. “Hello. I also need your help using the water machine.”

Seungkwan blinks back to himself. “Oh, sure, I’ll show you.” 

He understands the struggle—the first time he stayed over at Minghao’s apartment he battled the temperature knobs for a solid five minutes before he discovered a trickle of water that had more pressure than a drinking fountain and also didn’t burn the first two layers of his skin off. 

Once he’s laid out a pair of Hansol’s old sweatpants and t-shirt on the closed toilet lid, he leans around the plastic screen and turns the water on the way he likes it. “Alright, that should be fi...ne…” 

Mingyu is down to his pants and no shirt in the corridor. Despite his earlier teasing, he doesn’t draw any attention to it. Seungkwan averts his eyes towards the ceiling so that he doesn’t have to look at the way Mingyu’s necklace is sitting in the valley of his pecs

“Thank you! It’s so complicated,” Mingyu says brightly, joining him in the bathroom despite the complete lack of space. 

“You’re welcome,” Seungkwan squeaks, desperately slipping past like a fish escaping the net. “Goodnight!”

It takes Seungkwan a long time to fall asleep, and when he does, he only kind of, sort of, hopes that his entire day was a fever dream so that he doesn’t have to deal with the consequences of his decisions come morning.

♡♡♡

Someone is playing music in the apartment. 

Seungkwan sits up straight in his bed and pieces his soul back together (wakes up) before flinging the covers back and stumbling out of his bedroom with one eye half closed. 

The second he opens his door, a pigeon flies into his face.

“UGH!” He shrieks and stumbles back into the wall, flapping his hands to chase it away. “What the fuck?”

The singing cuts off, but the instrumental music carries on. Seungkwan clings to the doorway, chest heaving. 

“Good morning, Seungkwan!” Mingyu swings into view with a bowl propped on his hip, whisking whatever is inside with a big smile. He’s wearing an apron that Seungkwan didn’t even know he owned. “It’s a beautiful day!”

“Why is there a bird in here?” Seungkwan asks, feeling hysterical. “And where’s that music coming from?”

“Ah, sorry,” Mingyu laughs and the music just… stops. “I don’t even realise I’m doing it, sometimes.”

Seungkwan tugs his hair and closes his eyes. Okay. Okayokayokay. “I need coffee. I need… I’m going to shower, and then I’m going to feel… not insane.”

“Okay!” Mingyu says, sliding back into the kitchen and clattering around. 

“Okay.” Seungkwan makes his way to the bathroom without letting go of the wall.

♡♡♡

Take two.  Seungkwan exits the bathroom fully dressed with his hands held up in a fighting stance, but there is no pigeon this time. The evil is defeated. He checks his hair in the mirror before walking out to the main room, following the glorious smell of coffee and food. 

He freezes in the entrance.

Mingyu is sitting at their table by the window, absolutely surrounded by food: waffles stacked five servings high, an entire fruit platter, slices of omelette, rice, kimchi, juice and coffee. 

Seungkwan walks over to the second chair and sits down in a daze.

“What would you like first?” Mingyu asks.

“Where did you get all this food?” Seungkwan asks, accepting the cup of coffee that is handed to him. 

“Oh, I just found some friends,” Mingyu says flippantly, which is weird, but not weird enough to distract Seungkwan from the feast laid out before him. 

He takes a sip of the coffee and raises his eyebrows—it’s made exactly the way he likes it. Who  _ is  _ this guy? 

Mingyu stacks a plate full of food and passes it over, and Seungkwan doesn’t have the heart to say that he’s really not a breakfast person, not when Mingyu is looking at him so expectantly. 

He takes a big bite of omelette and rice and doesn’t have to fake the sound of satisfaction. 

“Oh m’god,” he says, stuffing his mouth full of food, “this is incredible.”

“Thank you,” Mingyu shimmies in his seat. He serves himself and takes such a concerningly large mouthful that Seungkwan pauses to watch him chew and swallow to make sure he doesn’t choke. “Do you like it?”

“It’s great,” Seungkwan says honestly. “Have you heard from Seokmin?”

“You remembered!” Mingyu gushes. He takes his necklace out from Hansol’s hideous old Hard Rock Cafe t-shirt (Seungkwan doesn’t know which city it’s from and he doesn’t care, fuck that place. No, he hasn’t been. No, you won’t catch him  _ ever _ stepping foot inside a single franchise.) 

Mingyu holds the jade in his palm with his eyes scrunched for a few seconds before his shoulders slump. “I can’t feel him yet,” he pouts.

“Does he have a phone?” 

Silence.

“So you can call him?”

“Like a fairy godmother?” Mingyu frowns.

Alright, so they’re still doing this. Seungkwan tosses back the rest of his coffee; he can do all things through caffeine that strengthens him. 

He takes out his phone and waves it like a wand. “Bippity boppity, Boo Seungkwan. Call Joshua Hong.” 

Joshua picks up on the second ring. “Hello?”

Seungkwan hangs up. “Ta-da.” 

“Wow! That’s amazing!” Mingyu takes the phone and squints at the charging port. “How do you fit an entire man inside such a tiny device?”

“Magic,” Seungkwan says, taking his phone back before Mingyu can drop it in the honey pot. Since when did they have a  _ honey pot _ ?

“Fascinating,” Mingyu gushes. Seungkwan would love to know what vitamin regime he’s on to make him so chipper. It’s like he’ll die if he stops being gracious for even one moment. Maybe it’s just part of the character. “I hope Seokmin finds one of those on his travels. It would surely be a lot simpler.” 

His dreamy stare focuses back on Seungkwan, and then he’s all smiles and sparkling eyes and luscious hair flipped into an uneven part that is making Seungkwan feel like an ant under the magnifying glass of a child who doesn’t get enough attention from their parents.

There isn’t a lot of time to examine the feeling, however, because the front door of the apartment beeps once in quiet warning before it swings open and Minghao walks in.

“Seungkwannie, are you home? Shua-hyung said something weird last night and you didn't answer my… text…”

Minghao freezes. He looks lovely in a thin blue cardigan and high-waisted pants that swish around his ankles long after he stops moving. He’s wearing the glasses Seungkwan bought him at the markets last week. 

He does  _ not _ look happy.

“Who’s this,” he says, voice flat. 

“Hello! I’m Kim Mingyu! Prince of And—” Seungkwan scrambles to clamp a hand over Mingyu’s mouth. Mingyu finishes his sentence anyway, hands gesticulating in an awkward seated bow.

“Hi hyung,” Seungkwan says breathlessly. “Funny story.”

Minghao’s anger never shows through his body. He’s too composed for that. It only shows on his face, and in his voice when he says, “I don’t want to hear it” and walks back out the door.

“Shit,” Seungkwan hisses, leaping over the folded-out couch and rushing after him, ignoring Mingyu’s distressed call.

“Minghao! Hyung! Wait.” He jogs to the elevator where Minghao is pushing the button relentlessly, like that’ll make it come any faster. When Seungkwan gets close enough, he turns to him like a wave of water.

“You never let me stay over,” he says sharply. “You have—not  _ once _ , Seungkwan. We’ve been together for six months! Who is that guy?! God, you don’t even eat breakfast! I’m—ugh.” He steps into the elevator the second it arrives. Seungkwan doesn’t even have the time to  _ breathe. _

“Hyung, it’s not what—” The doors slide closed on Minghao’s expression of hurt. “What it looks like,” he finishes lamely. 

He drags his feet back to the apartment and finds Mingyu clearing the table. “I’m so sorry if I did something wrong,” he says, shoulders hunched like the apology requires him to be smaller.

If it was anyone else, Seungkwan would already be two steps into a five-step homicide plan, but cussing Mingyu out right now would feel like yelling at a defenceless animal and Seungkwan may be righteous, but he’s not evil. 

He leans on the counter and says: “It’s not your fault. I should have just replied to his text.” 

He doesn’t say:  _ Minghao is probably threatened because my ex looks like you and also I’m terrible at commitment so it’s not too far of a stretch to imagine I’d have a hot guy cooking me breakfast at 10am on a Saturday but that’s on me, not you.  _

“Is he…” Mingyu wrings his hands. “Is that who you would marry? If you could?”

Seungkwan straightens up so quickly he gets a head rush. “We’re just seeing each other,” he says too loudly. “It’s serious but it is also casual. I’m an adult, I can have complex relationships if I want to!”

Mingyu looks vaguely frightened. “Sorry.”

Seungkwan drapes himself back over the counter. “Ugh, no  _ I’m _ sorry. That was so dramatic.”

“It  _ was _ kind of ridiculous,” Mingyu says, giggling like it’s a secret. 

Seungkwan looks up at him and laughs, too, helpless to the bubbling overflow coming from his chest. This whole thing is a mess. He may as well just go along with it.

“Ah, see, that’s much better,” Mingyu says, leaning his hip on the counter and crossing his beautiful arms. “Happiness looks wonderful on you.” He taps his cheeks and then gestures to Seungkwan’s. “Like bread!”

“Are you calling me a dinner roll?” Seungkwan gasps in mock offense.

Mingyu giggles. “No, I’m calling you lovely.”

“Oh,” Seungkwan deflates, face growing warm. “Well. I guess that’s alright.”

An amicable silence falls between them as they pack away the leftovers. For the first time, Mingyu looks settled, moving around the kitchen like he’s been here a hundred times before. Seungkwan feels oddly emotional seeing the space being used properly for once; neither he nor Hansol are particularly gifted at cooking, so it’s mostly used for Roommate Talks or 2am conversations over bowls of shitty cereal. 

He watches Mingyu wipe down the stove in his silly pink gloves with a smile. “Thank you,” he says absently. 

Mingyu looks up in pleasant surprise. “Of course, it’s the very least I could do.” He pulls the gloves off and drapes them over the edge of the sink. A cluster of swallows dance patterns outside the window and Mingyu looks at them with the same gentle wonder he has for every little thing—including Seungkwan, it seems. Which, he’s not sure  _ why _ , but he’ll take it.

Mingyu flutters close enough to hold one of Seungkwan’s hands between both of his. It feels so different; Seungkwan is used to the willowy piano-keys of Minghao’s fingers wrapped around his, tapping at his pulse point and dragging over his life line; the way Hansol holds his hand like he’s holding him steady.

Mingyu holds his hand like he is the most precious jewel in the world. Like he’s waiting for a rose to bloom between their palms the moment they let go. The intensity of him is overwhelming, but Seungkwan likes intense and over-the-top. Who would he be without it?

“You needn’t worry,” Mingyu says with a smile. “Minghao will forgive you.”

Seungkwan hums, waiting for the rest. 

“True love conquers all.”

Aaaaand there it is. 

“Okay, prince charming,” Seungkwan rolls his eyes. “Let’s see if it conquers my stupidly long list of chores.”

“Chores?!” Mingyu gasps. 

He sounds  _ delighted _ .

♡♡♡

**_Once upon a time…_ **

**_Well, no, it’s actually just the time Prince Mingyu was on his way to the palace to be married but then he fell into a magical pond and disappeared. It’s exactly the same one. We’re just back there. Okay, so:_ **

**_Once upon that one time…_ **

  
  


“Where is he?” Seokmin bursts into the garden with a hand on the hilt of his sword. “Where is my beloved?”

“Calm down, would you? He’s probably just hiding in the rose bushes.” Hoshi runs along through the grass by his feet. He is so tiny, there is no way a chipmunk can be of use in a missing persons investigation when Seokmin loses him all the time in his own home!

The music swells around them. Oh, it’s a masterpiece of despair: there are strings and trumpets and percussion crashing together like a thunderstorm.

Hoshi hops up onto a rock and wrinkles his nose at the crescendo. “Sheesh, you really are stressed.”

“Of course I’m stressed! Mingyu is  _ missing _ . What if he’s hurt?” Seokmin sits on the rock next to Hoshi and the music settles into a simmer of strings. A lone oboe sticks around to provide emotional support; Seokmin appreciates it.

“Your highness!” Chan, the coachman, rushes down the path towards them with tear-stained cheeks. “Prince Seokmin, I’m so sorry, I don’t know what happened. One moment he was here and the next he was gone! Like magic!”

Seokmin stands to greet the small man. “Slow down, it’s quite alright. Just tell me what you saw.”

Chan recounts his tale between watery sniffles and Seokmin looks around them until his eyes land on the pond. The music turns suspicious.

“Don’t you dare,” Hoshi warns.

“I have to,” Seokmin says, rushing over to the pond and drawing his sword. He points the blade at the water and shouts, “Magic waters! Take me to my beloved!” 

The fish swim fast enough to create a vortex, glowing and sparkling. A cold wind whips at Seokmin’s hair, and he feels no fear at all as he jumps feet-first into the pond. 

Hoshi squeaks, “Bye Chan!” and dives in after him. 

The pond settles back to itself almost instantly, leaving Chan the coachman windswept and gobsmacked in the quiet garden. He doesn’t get his own soundtrack. He’s rather sad about that. Maybe when he gets that promotion he’s been waiting for. 

“I deserve it,” Chan tells the sky.

Of course you do, Chan. Now, back to the carriage. Well done. You’ve been very helpful for the narrative.

As he disappears back to his duties, Jeonghan and Seungcheol emerge from the hedges with matching expressions of worry. Jeonghan hops off Seungcheol’s back and cautiously approaches the pond, ears swaying. He twitches his nose at the fish. 

“Will he be alright, do you think?” he asks softly. 

Seungcheol puts a wing around Jeonghan. “Prince Seokmin will find him.” 

The water ripples and shimmers like a wink. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! I am hoping the disney demon who possessed me to write this in a day will carry me through the next 3 chapters! they are all outlined and ready so pls anticipate!! have a nice day!!!


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